Leaves in the garage often mean leaves in the house as you track them inside. Some tag along with your car as you drive in, while others blow inside your garage when you leave the door up. There's no way to stop every leaf from entering, but several options exist to help reduce the number of leaves that wind up on your garage floor.

Thresholds

Most garages have entries that are flat, at the same level as the driveway. This makes it simple to drive into, but it doesn't do anything to block leaves. Installing a raised garage floor threshold helps stop leaves as well as dirt and water from entering your garage. These tend to be 2 inches or less in height -- just high enough to form a small barrier without making it difficult to drive over. The thresholds stop many leaves even when the door is open.

Door Seals

Many garage doors come equipped with bottom seals, but these can degrade over time. These flexible tubes collapse as they touch the garage floor, creating a barrier that conforms to any imperfections in the floor. This helps keep dirt and leaves from entering when the garage door is down. The seals come in a variety of materials including rubber and vinyl, and different seals work with metal or wood doors. The downside of these seals is that they can't serve as a leaf barrier when the door is lifted.

Screens

When you often use your garage with the door open -- letting it serve as outdoor living space, for example -- a screen barrier might fit your needs. These screens might be permanent, formed screen panels or flexible screen sheets. The panels have a bottom seal similar to that of a standard garage door to help prevent leaves from entering when you have the garage door open. Flexible screens typically are weighted at the bottom to prevent leaves and other debris from entering. Both offer door options so you can enter and exit easily, and they fit inside your garage door. These usually offer protection only when your main door is lifted.

Installation

For many thresholds and bottom seals, there's no need to call a professional for installation. With a threshold, you typically measure the door width and cut it to fit, and then place it on the floor and close the door on it to make sure it's correctly positioned and not preventing the door from closing properly. Trace the edges, and apply the adhesive inside the traced lines -- most kits include adhesive, but if not, look for one that's designed to work with concrete and the material of your threshold, such as aluminum or vinyl. Press the threshold back in place and close the door on it for 24 hours before driving over it. With many bottom door seals, you slide the old seal out of the tracks and slide the new one in. Flexible screen sheets typically require you to install hooks or connectors on the top and sides of your garage door frame before hanging the sheets. The solid screen panels are the only option that often require professional installation -- they usually add new tracks under the garage door tracks so you can lift them when you need to move your car.